ile his
fingers busied themselves with the irons on Armand's wrist.

"Don't touch that brute's filthy coat with your dainty fingers, dear
heart," he said gaily. "Great Lord! I have worn that wretch's clothes
for over two hours; I feel as if the dirt had penetrated to my bones."

Then with that gesture so habitual to him he took her head between his
two hands, and drawing her to him until the wan light from without lit
up the face that he worshipped, he gazed his fill into her eyes.

She could only see the outline of his head silhouetted against the
wind-tossed sky; she could not see his eyes, nor his lips, but she felt
his nearness, and the happiness of that almost caused her to swoon.

"Come out into the open, my lady fair," he murmured, and though she
could not see, she could feel that he smiled; "let God's pure air blow
through your hair and round your dear head. Then, if you can walk so
far, there's a small half-way house close by here. I have knocked up
the none too amiable host. You and Armand could have half an hour's rest
there before we go further on our way."

"But you, Percy?--are you safe?"

"Yes, m'dear, we are all of us safe until morning-time enough to reach
Le Portel, and to be aboard the Day-Dream before mine amiable friend M.
Chambertin has discovered his worthy colleague lying gagged and bound
inside the chapel of the Holy Sepulchre. By Gad! how old Heron will
curse--the moment he can open his mouth!"

He half helped, half lifted her out of the carriage. The strong pure air
suddenly rushing right through to her lungs made her feel faint, and she
almost fell. But it was good to feel herself falling, when one pair of
arms amongst the millions on the earth were there to receive her.

"Can you walk, dear heart?" he asked. "Lean well on me--it is not far,
and the rest will do you good."

"But you, Percy--"

He laughed, and the most complete joy of living seemed to resound
through that laugh. Her arm was in his, and for one moment he stood
still while his eyes swept the far reaches of the country, the mellow
distance still wrapped in its mantle of indigo, still untouched by the
mysterious light of the waning moon.

He pressed her arm against his heart, but his right hand was stretched
out towards the black wall of the forest behind him, towards the dark
crests of the pines in which the dying wind sent its last mournful
sighs.

"Dear heart," he said, and his voice quivered with the intensity of